“Racial Internet Literacy” from JessieNYC on Vimeo.
Daniels, J. (2012, September 4). “Racial Internet Literacy” (Vimeo). Retrieved January 13, 2016, from https://vimeo.com/48821485

Cyber Racism and Social Inequality Online

Today we are reading “Race and Racism in Internet Studies: A Review and Critique” (2012) by CUNY Grad Center professor and sociology Jessie Daniels, who is a colleague and acquaintance.  The article appeared in New Media & Society, a great journal that features many articles about new media — always on, asynchronous media online.

This video reminds me of the influence of my mentor Mike Wesch’s YouTube videos on this kind of digital storytelling. How can we implement this in a short time in my winter intercession course? That is what I’ll ask my students today.  I want them to start contributing to this blog for the next 10 days.

Notice the similarity between Daniel’s video on Racial Internet Literacy (2012) from Vimeo and The Machine is Us/ing Us (2007) from YouTube:

Wesch, M. (2007, March 8). The Machine is Us/ing Us (Final Version). Retrieved January 13, 2016, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLlGopyXT_g

Growing Apart; Working Together Online

If the sociological study of social inequality tells us that connecting our individual problems, seeing the connections between your life and mine as well as how social structures and ideologies keep us trapped in the welter of our daily experience, as C. Wright Mills articulated, then doing collaborative storytelling online about racism might help.

The final project in the course requires students to share what they are learning with at elast 20 people. I’ve always been interested in going public with our public learning. In the age of social media, institutions of higher learning can be hubs broadcasting social justice and change. But what does it take to work together and give up the neoliberalist notion that meritocracy is succeeding alone?